"The defining moment of the young 21st century." This is well put. People my age (born 1950s) and living in "the West" (US & Canada) came of age in the shadow of Auschwitz, a (if not "the") defining moment of the 20th century. Auschwitz was constantly evoked, memorialized, and remembered. Among other things, Auschwitz was cited as a reason for the establishment of a "postwar liberal international world order," as a dire warning and a vow ("never again"), and as the bedrock reason for defending/excusing Israel. The Gaza genocide will cast a shadow over the remainder of the current century, and you are right to point to the profound consequences of this atrocity on mass consciousness, enabled by the dying "postwar liberal international order".
A war with 53K deaths (as per Hamas) will be the defining moment of the century? Not 9/11, not the Iraq War, not the Arab Spring and Syrian Civil War, not COVID, not a Taiwan War if it starts? Color me skeptical. The Saudis are going to join the Abraham Accords.
All mortality death tolls are usually 4-5x recorded deaths. Also the 53K figure are only identified corpses from trauma recorded by the morgue, there are probably 10-15K buried under rubble (Israel bombed the bulldozers so can’t be reclaimed). I’d say we’re probably at 275-300K death toll but importantly the war also isn’t over and the stated end goal is liquidating the population in Gaza
I am very skeptical of the death toll being anywhere near 275-300 K. Even the Lancet article which is very partisan was not so high and was still in the five digits. You're right that there might be 10-15 K corpses so we're at 63-68 K deaths, but you also have to discount natural deaths, deaths from Hamas, PIJ, etc. We should have some postwar estimates. Do you think that all morality death tolls are usually 4-5x recorded deaths? Where are you getting that from? In previous wars, the estimates of the Gaza Health Ministry have been the highest estimates, Israeli estimates tend to be lower and UN estimates in the middle. This 4-5x thing sounds like propaganda.
I really don't think it's fair to say that *liquidating* Gaza's population is a stated end goal. Are you saying he wants to kill them? Do you have a direct quote from Netanyahu saying this is an end goal of the war? I can only find him saying that he wants to "implement the Trump Plan".
I take this as just that one he wants to flatter Trump, and who does not these days, and two he wants to allow voluntary emigration from the ruins of Gaza. Indeed when Trump unveiled his plan at the press conference, Netanyahu stood next to him and said that he agreed with the Trump plan and thus supported voluntary migration, which is what he understood the Trump plan to mean. So I mostly think Netanyahu wants people to be allowed to leave the rubble of Gaza, which is pretty reasonable, and he wants to flatter Trump and stay on Trump's good side.
I don't think that Netanyahu views US sovereignty in Gaza as a war goal either even though this is also part of the Trump plan. I mean, you would not say that it is accurate to say that US sovereignty over Gaza is the stated end goal either yes?
The 4-5x number is a standard back of envelope for wartime deaths because the overwhelming majority of people killed in war are actually not killed by so called “direct causes” like being shot or bombed but instead from being concentrated in areas without access to necessities of life, force marched around etc. These deaths are still included in total calculated tolls of events since they wouldn’t have happened otherwise. Even Anne Frank died of typhus technically.
Regarding Netanyahu’s ambitions, he said in the Israeli press and to the Knesset that the actual goal of the war is to remove the population from Gaza, ostensibly through displacement but inevitably a large number will die from disease, malnutrition and other indirect causes in the course of that which I suppose would make the subsequent displacement slightly easier.
Regarding the psychological impact of this event globally the unprecedented technological environment where every detail and death is being meticulously broadcast for nearly two years now is a new variable.
I agree that the fact that people constantly broadcast every death in a way that they did not for Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Ethiopia, and so on has an effect yes. This is hardly a new phenomenon. There has always been a lot of propaganda out there. This war is not by any means the worst of the century. We will see much worse things.
So you say that the Gaza Ministry of Health numbers, ~53K are reliable, but then you say they are off by a factor of 4 and it's actually 275K? Do you actually think 2.2 million died in the Syrian Civil War rather than 500K? How about Yemen? Sudan? These wars have reported death tolls into the six digits.
I think guess that if anything this war has far fewer indirect deaths because of the large number of humanitarian NGOs. But OK let's look at some statistics.
Regarding the Holocaust, here is GPT saying that of the 6M Holocaust deaths, some 0.8-1 M (so like 15%) died of these kinds of indirect things you describe, and the remaining ~85% were directly killed by the Nazis. Say it's 15K under the rubble so it's 68K and we only count 85%. We are now at 80K.
Here’s how the roughly six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust break down by primary method of killing (all figures from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum)
Holocaust Encyclopedia
:
Gassed in extermination (“killing”) centers:
Approximately 2.7 million Jews were murdered in the five dedicated gas-chamber killing centers (Chełmno, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka II, Auschwitz-Birkenau).
Holocaust Encyclopedia
Shot in mass-murder operations:
About 2 million Jews were executed by firing squads in mass-shooting actions carried out by the Einsatzgruppen and their local collaborators across occupied Eastern Europe.
Holocaust Encyclopedia
Died of disease, starvation & overwork:
Between 800,000 and 1,000,000 perished in ghettos, forced-labor camps, and concentration camps due to deliberate privation—lack of food, sanitation, shelter, medical care—and the brutal camp regime.
Holocaust Encyclopedia
Other violent killings (e.g., riots, individual executions, death marches):
Roughly 250,000 more were killed outside these settings in antisemitic pogroms, solitary executions, on forced marches, and similar acts of violence.
Holocaust Encyclopedia
Together, these categories account for the six million Jewish lives extinguished under Nazi rule.
Can you provide an actual direct link to Netanyahu saying that? I looked it up and I saw him talking about the Trump plan (which also calls for US sovereignty over the Gaza Strip.... perhaps it's a "take him seriously, not literally").
Sorry, I’m not sure of your reading comprehension level but the Gaza MoH figures only cover deaths by trauma. No other deaths are counted. I wouldn’t outsource your thinking to ChatGPT as yet either.
Thank you for this Murtaza. Any history book (colonial or anticolonial) tells of one of two results for military occupation projects:
- Either the natives are genocided until they are completely defeated, with Australia and the US as historical precedents.
- Or the colonialists are defeated and expelled, and this is the history from the Philippines, to China, to even South America. Sometimes it takes over a century, but it is what happens eventually.
The only caveat I have is that I am not aware of a colonial occupational project that has a 50/50 split between the native populations and the occupying imports. Is this a new case study in history? I hope not.
It’s a unique case for sure and the even numbers raise the prospect of highly violent ending. But I think in this case it’s more constructive to think of it as 300M Arabs vs 7M Israelis or even 2bn Muslims who mostly all feel the same way about it. On those odds the only rational thing for the Israelis to do is follow the Afrikaners by just acceding to a political solution.
I’ll disagree with you on this bit because even though there are 2bn Muslims, the distance alone is an isolating factor. As for the Arabs, their rulers are actively undermining the public opinion of the societies, and/or really do not care about the Palestinians. Their interest in fact lies with having Israel in place because it legitimizes the American interest in keeping them in check as opposed to other leaders who might actually care…
Distance is an isolating factor to a degree but we are living in a world that is constantly shrinking due to technology. You could say this in a psychological sense with communication technology but also a practical one with advancing missiles, drones, aircraft etc. I used to think that Arab leaders were purely craven and I still sort of do but it’s kind of a generational thing. To take Egypt as an example the younger generation of officers that does not remember or like Camp David is going to have different views than the Sisi generation.
The younger generation will look at pictures of Gaza and not want this to happen to Cairo. Oh and the younger generation hates the Muslim Brotherhood too. Jordan just banned it.
Most Israeli opinion polls consistently show that the majority of Israelis believe that Netanyahu is prolonging the war for purely domestic political reasons. Once the war is over then his coalition will fracture and he will have to face a full trial (with no delays like what is happening currently) on corruption charges.
That being said, while I agree with you that it is a 2bn vs 7 million sectarian fight between Jews and Muslims, the core difference between this and other “colonial” conflicts is (1) Israeli Jews have a strong attachment to the land that predates the Islamic conquest, (2) the vast majority have nowhere else to go so will stay and fight, and (3) there is no alternative reality where Muslims accept the Jews as equals which leads the Israelis to view this through the lens of a permanent war: October 7th is the inevitable outcome if the Israeli State is incapable of defending her own people.
Netanyahu will go down as one of the most destructive individuals in Jewish history and one of the most despised leaders in the early 21st century. I can easily foresee in 10 years a significant reduction in military aid to Israel from the U.S.. However, the Jews are not Afrikaners, they are not pied noirs, and this very paranoia is why they will be more persistent than even you could predict.
I agree they will not be going anywhere for the reasons you identified which is why this conflict is and will be much worse than any of the other anticolonial wars. Maybe some dual citizens will leave if things get too difficult but a core of at least a few million will stay no matter what. I didn’t get too deep into the scenarios but use of nuclear weapons by Israel and October 7 x 1000 strike me as foreseeable outcomes in the long-term. Regarding Netanyahu he is a very polarizing figure but it would be overstatement to say he doesn’t have a strong and significant base that still supports him. He’s a charismatic Great Man of History ultimately and he has had a profound impact on the course of this conflict and beyond.
I am a Zionist so you need to take my opinion with a grain of salt, but for the "Zionist entity" to be destroyed it needs the Arab and Muslim world to do something totally paradoxical: accept Israel as a Jewish state, open up trade and security relations with them, and foster some form of visa-free travel including allowing foreign Muslims to go to Al-Aqsa etc.
Israel's very raison d'etre is the protection of the Jewish people. Protection from what, exactly? The threat of extermination. So take that away by fostering and institutionalising interaction between Israeli Jews and non-Palestinian Arab Muslims. It will take decades to work it's way through both Palestinian Muslim and Israeli Jewish societies, but what Israeli Jews really want is acceptance by their Muslim neighbours.
I give the above 0% chance of happening. This is a sectarian fight and has been that way for decades.
No need to take with grain of salt I appreciate hearing perspective of Israelis and Zionists. I've always shared the view that its easier to integrate economically and normalize political ties as a means of ameliorating political conflicts. Due to decisions made on both sides at this point, this option gradually ceased to be realistic as a means of ending this particular war. I wouldn't say its totally impossible but its very much at the brink now given how the current situation ends (if it ends). The irony is that the Arab League is now more in favor of a pragmatic outcome and has been for a few decades now while the Israeli government takes the more maximalist and messianic perspective and rejects a 1967-ish settlement with the Palestinians and regional integration except on terms of submission. If they do liquidate Gaza (seems likely at this point) there are just no diplomatic off-ramps left and we have to resign ourselves to the unhappy conclusion that is something like the Ninth Crusade that will take up generations of violent and non-violent struggle.
You talk about the 2 billion Muslims and yet many countries are lining up to join the Abraham Accords, and the Muslim world is secularizing and going through a demographic transition.
Israel's fertility rate remains high while the Palestinians' fertility rate consistently drops. If there was a one-state solution *right now*, then Jews would already be the majority. UNRWA is facing massive funding cuts because of 10/7 and Israel banned them from operating. Lebanon and Syria are talking about normalizing with Israel.
I think you are just way off on this one. I really do think that the Saudis and Emiratis are making the right bet here.
You have to either be a shill or an inbecile to frame this being about religion and not about occupied vs occupier. Most opinion polls shows majority Israeli support for the genocide in Gaza, and that speaks volumes
If this is not a sectarian war then Jews in Israel or around the world would not be attacked, global Muslim sentiment would not be universally outraged, but pretending this is “occupied” vs “occupier” is just an attempt to twist the conflict into something that is not a full and accurate representation of reality.
I like the link to Chinese arms mentioned in the previous article. However, I am not sure I agree with some of the introductory statements. In particular « none of [Israel’s neighbours] are able to intervene… even if they oppose it ». Given Egypt and Jordan’s explicit involvement in helping Israel, it seems hard to conclude they are reluctantly standing out. Even Turkey I think you mentioned in a previous article has only issued pithy statements to date and is more interested in their own long term power gain. If we are returning to power politics from the liberal order it seems unlikely that the long term power play of Turkey is Palestinian liberation rather than their own advancement.
Your analysis of the big picture (regression to the mean) seems spot on but I fail to see how Israel's short-term decisions in Gaza make much difference. If you had asked me about the Muslim world's relationship to Israel on Oct 6, 2023, I would have said that (i) most Muslims are strongly opposed to Israel's existence, as are many Muslim governments but (ii) a few Muslim countries, driven by their elites, have decided it's better to accept Israel's existence and make peace. If you asked me the same question today, my answer would largely be the same. The only difference being that Saudi Arabia joining the 'peace with Israel' club is much less likely or immediate today (which of course was one of Hamas' motives for the launching the attack.
So essentially after 2 years of war we have a major slowdown in reproachment between the Saudis and Israel, no backtracking by countries that signed the Camp David or Abraham Accords, and continued hostility from the Arab Street. Which is not a great situation for Israel, but also not one that's likely to be modified in less than generations no matter what Israel does.
This is good analysis but I actually disagree in the sense that there is a substrata of military officers, bureaucrats, intelligence people etc of the younger generation who are now very radicalized about this subject and think Camp David was a mistake, there are no good Israelis etc. This is a critical layer of people in any society and arguably more important than the masses who can be swayed one way or another with enough effort.
One can finally hope for an end to the conflict, or it may last another 700 years instead of 70. If the only thing left are high lander rules, and there can only be one, than that's the only option remaining. If this article is right and the Islamic world, will re-arm and modernize, then this Israel's window to do it, and simply announce the size of their nuclear stockpile after the job is done.
For Gen Alpha (or whatever we are supposed to call people born around the turn of the century) the Gaza genocide is a formative political experience. Moreover, it is linked to a cause (Palestine) that has been an open wound for at least three earlier generations of people who identify as Arabs or Muslims.
You should talk to Yair Rosenberg again. A podcast or something would be nice, or some written exchange like point and counterpoint. The Abrahamic Alliance against the Iranian regime is a great idea, and I saw your piece on how the Iranian regime is ideologically anti-American and you can't have Trump towers in Tehran. I'm open to the Palestinian state *in principle* but you have to make sure it doesn't become a Hamas state and I'm a bit skeptical of that.
Your friendship with Yair Rosenberg is great and inspiring, and among the critics of Israel you are one of the most intellectually honest there is. It also helps that you are not against the existence of Israel, which is good.
The anti-Israel crowd has bet a lot on the genocide accusation, but I think the legal case is quite weak. I think when the ruling comes down it's going to be good for Israel. Falsely accusing a county full of Jews of genocide is really not a good look, for obvious historical reasons. Anti-Israel sentiment in the US seems as bad as it's ever going to get. I don't know if people will think about this war much in 20 years. People nowadays barely remember 9/11. Americans who are 10 years old now won't remember it, but they might remember the false accusation of genocide. They will see the Abraham Accords though.
I expect the Saudis to join the Abraham Accords, and Palestinian fertility to crash down so the demographics will become more favorable to Israel. Already it's falling very quickly. A modernized Islamic world means a less nationalistic and religious one and one with falling fertility rates. If Muslim countries do look more like Turkey, I expect more accommodating sentiments towards Israel. What you actually see in places like Tunisia is secularism and low TFRs without getting rich, so the cultural environment of Turkey but without the economic strength of Turkey. Seems like they will become less threatening to Israel if anything.
Palestinian TFR will fall below replacement while Israeli TFR will remain high. And falling TFRs in other Arab states means that these states will start wanting to accepting Palestinian migrants to support their aging populations.
Due to the transition away from oil, the Saudis and Emiratis will be more reliant on tech and AI, which is a big part of the Abraham Accords. Qatar will not have a good time as everyone switches to solar. They are big funders of Islamists.
I don't see the conflict as becoming more sectarian and anti-Muslim at all. There are Muslim Bedouin IDF soldiers killed in the war, and the Saudis want to join the Abraham Accords. There is even talk of Syria joining.
I also think that Israel is going to become more and more self-sufficient in arms and rely less on the United States. I also see the Israeli tech sector continuing to grow as it has been in the past. Even amid the war, there is a lot of investment in tech. Israel will become a big player in AI and so on.
Why are you advocating for the re-creation of an open air prison? Arab states and militant Islamists have wanted to eradicate Israel since its creation. Maybe a more prosperous Middle East will mean fewer countries interested in being hotbeds of terrorism and fewer individuals interested in throwing their lives away. Regardless, a separate Palestinian state, such as Gaza, will clearly just continue to be used to foment suffering of its population and used as a pretext for continued violence.
The key question remains however as to how deep-rooted the anti-Islam feelings there are in the former colonial powers such as France and Britain? Might these forces see a bulwark, albeit a very misguided and out of control, Israel as a strategic necessity in a world where Cold War fears of Soviet advance from the Middle East have been rekindled by Putin? I can accept the scale comparisons between Muslim countries and Israel but since the 1967 war there has been no sign of a unified or Pan Arab sentiment.
Most of the Muslim states in the Gulf are also Western clients though and don't seem to care too much about the Palestinian cause, only self-interest. Egypt is the second biggest recipient of US military aid after Israel, and even China is still benefitting from the US global system. Your thesis about the balance of power swinging away from Israel relies on the US collapsing to the extent that the entire Western neocolonial system begins to unfold and the US withdraws from or faces diminished influence in the middle-east, or can no longer afford the financial burden of arming Israel, precipitating the point at which Israel switches from being America's most important strategic asset to being little more than a liability. But this is still decades away, so I feel like your thesis is taking a longer term vision 30-50 years from now or even further. The change in global opinion will hopefully come well before that, without the need to wait decades for a global power shift of that magnitude. In the case of Apartheid South Africa it took 20 years after the UN convention on apartheid for America's allies in Western Europe to finally change their stance thus compelling a change of policy from Washington regarding its support for Apartheid South Africa. This may yet happen with Israel, but the US will only be compelled to temper its support for Israel if all its allies desert it and the US finds itself completely isolated on the issue of Palestine. Significant public movements within Western Europe will have to take responsibility for pressuring their respective governments to turn their backs on US-Israeli policy. But beyond that I don't know what they longterm forecast is.
To be clear I do see this forecast as being a generational one that would come to pass in the lifetime of people who are kids today not a short-medium term outcome. That said history does move on fast forward these days due to technology so you never know.
So why no Arab or any other countries just bomb israel out of its existence? why are we all watching the destruction of a proud brave courageous nation?
"The defining moment of the young 21st century." This is well put. People my age (born 1950s) and living in "the West" (US & Canada) came of age in the shadow of Auschwitz, a (if not "the") defining moment of the 20th century. Auschwitz was constantly evoked, memorialized, and remembered. Among other things, Auschwitz was cited as a reason for the establishment of a "postwar liberal international world order," as a dire warning and a vow ("never again"), and as the bedrock reason for defending/excusing Israel. The Gaza genocide will cast a shadow over the remainder of the current century, and you are right to point to the profound consequences of this atrocity on mass consciousness, enabled by the dying "postwar liberal international order".
A war with 53K deaths (as per Hamas) will be the defining moment of the century? Not 9/11, not the Iraq War, not the Arab Spring and Syrian Civil War, not COVID, not a Taiwan War if it starts? Color me skeptical. The Saudis are going to join the Abraham Accords.
All mortality death tolls are usually 4-5x recorded deaths. Also the 53K figure are only identified corpses from trauma recorded by the morgue, there are probably 10-15K buried under rubble (Israel bombed the bulldozers so can’t be reclaimed). I’d say we’re probably at 275-300K death toll but importantly the war also isn’t over and the stated end goal is liquidating the population in Gaza
I am very skeptical of the death toll being anywhere near 275-300 K. Even the Lancet article which is very partisan was not so high and was still in the five digits. You're right that there might be 10-15 K corpses so we're at 63-68 K deaths, but you also have to discount natural deaths, deaths from Hamas, PIJ, etc. We should have some postwar estimates. Do you think that all morality death tolls are usually 4-5x recorded deaths? Where are you getting that from? In previous wars, the estimates of the Gaza Health Ministry have been the highest estimates, Israeli estimates tend to be lower and UN estimates in the middle. This 4-5x thing sounds like propaganda.
I really don't think it's fair to say that *liquidating* Gaza's population is a stated end goal. Are you saying he wants to kill them? Do you have a direct quote from Netanyahu saying this is an end goal of the war? I can only find him saying that he wants to "implement the Trump Plan".
I take this as just that one he wants to flatter Trump, and who does not these days, and two he wants to allow voluntary emigration from the ruins of Gaza. Indeed when Trump unveiled his plan at the press conference, Netanyahu stood next to him and said that he agreed with the Trump plan and thus supported voluntary migration, which is what he understood the Trump plan to mean. So I mostly think Netanyahu wants people to be allowed to leave the rubble of Gaza, which is pretty reasonable, and he wants to flatter Trump and stay on Trump's good side.
I don't think that Netanyahu views US sovereignty in Gaza as a war goal either even though this is also part of the Trump plan. I mean, you would not say that it is accurate to say that US sovereignty over Gaza is the stated end goal either yes?
We’ve done some reporting on how casualties are calculated (highly recommend this convo for info: https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/doctors-gaza-death-toll-evacuations-children) and the Shin Bet has said that the Gaza MoH figures are reliable.
The 4-5x number is a standard back of envelope for wartime deaths because the overwhelming majority of people killed in war are actually not killed by so called “direct causes” like being shot or bombed but instead from being concentrated in areas without access to necessities of life, force marched around etc. These deaths are still included in total calculated tolls of events since they wouldn’t have happened otherwise. Even Anne Frank died of typhus technically.
Regarding Netanyahu’s ambitions, he said in the Israeli press and to the Knesset that the actual goal of the war is to remove the population from Gaza, ostensibly through displacement but inevitably a large number will die from disease, malnutrition and other indirect causes in the course of that which I suppose would make the subsequent displacement slightly easier.
Regarding the psychological impact of this event globally the unprecedented technological environment where every detail and death is being meticulously broadcast for nearly two years now is a new variable.
I agree that the fact that people constantly broadcast every death in a way that they did not for Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Ethiopia, and so on has an effect yes. This is hardly a new phenomenon. There has always been a lot of propaganda out there. This war is not by any means the worst of the century. We will see much worse things.
So you say that the Gaza Ministry of Health numbers, ~53K are reliable, but then you say they are off by a factor of 4 and it's actually 275K? Do you actually think 2.2 million died in the Syrian Civil War rather than 500K? How about Yemen? Sudan? These wars have reported death tolls into the six digits.
I think guess that if anything this war has far fewer indirect deaths because of the large number of humanitarian NGOs. But OK let's look at some statistics.
Regarding the Holocaust, here is GPT saying that of the 6M Holocaust deaths, some 0.8-1 M (so like 15%) died of these kinds of indirect things you describe, and the remaining ~85% were directly killed by the Nazis. Say it's 15K under the rubble so it's 68K and we only count 85%. We are now at 80K.
Here’s how the roughly six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust break down by primary method of killing (all figures from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum)
Holocaust Encyclopedia
:
Gassed in extermination (“killing”) centers:
Approximately 2.7 million Jews were murdered in the five dedicated gas-chamber killing centers (Chełmno, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka II, Auschwitz-Birkenau).
Holocaust Encyclopedia
Shot in mass-murder operations:
About 2 million Jews were executed by firing squads in mass-shooting actions carried out by the Einsatzgruppen and their local collaborators across occupied Eastern Europe.
Holocaust Encyclopedia
Died of disease, starvation & overwork:
Between 800,000 and 1,000,000 perished in ghettos, forced-labor camps, and concentration camps due to deliberate privation—lack of food, sanitation, shelter, medical care—and the brutal camp regime.
Holocaust Encyclopedia
Other violent killings (e.g., riots, individual executions, death marches):
Roughly 250,000 more were killed outside these settings in antisemitic pogroms, solitary executions, on forced marches, and similar acts of violence.
Holocaust Encyclopedia
Together, these categories account for the six million Jewish lives extinguished under Nazi rule.
Can you provide an actual direct link to Netanyahu saying that? I looked it up and I saw him talking about the Trump plan (which also calls for US sovereignty over the Gaza Strip.... perhaps it's a "take him seriously, not literally").
Sorry, I’m not sure of your reading comprehension level but the Gaza MoH figures only cover deaths by trauma. No other deaths are counted. I wouldn’t outsource your thinking to ChatGPT as yet either.
thank you for sharing.
I despair...
Thank you for this Murtaza. Any history book (colonial or anticolonial) tells of one of two results for military occupation projects:
- Either the natives are genocided until they are completely defeated, with Australia and the US as historical precedents.
- Or the colonialists are defeated and expelled, and this is the history from the Philippines, to China, to even South America. Sometimes it takes over a century, but it is what happens eventually.
The only caveat I have is that I am not aware of a colonial occupational project that has a 50/50 split between the native populations and the occupying imports. Is this a new case study in history? I hope not.
It’s a unique case for sure and the even numbers raise the prospect of highly violent ending. But I think in this case it’s more constructive to think of it as 300M Arabs vs 7M Israelis or even 2bn Muslims who mostly all feel the same way about it. On those odds the only rational thing for the Israelis to do is follow the Afrikaners by just acceding to a political solution.
I’ll disagree with you on this bit because even though there are 2bn Muslims, the distance alone is an isolating factor. As for the Arabs, their rulers are actively undermining the public opinion of the societies, and/or really do not care about the Palestinians. Their interest in fact lies with having Israel in place because it legitimizes the American interest in keeping them in check as opposed to other leaders who might actually care…
Distance is an isolating factor to a degree but we are living in a world that is constantly shrinking due to technology. You could say this in a psychological sense with communication technology but also a practical one with advancing missiles, drones, aircraft etc. I used to think that Arab leaders were purely craven and I still sort of do but it’s kind of a generational thing. To take Egypt as an example the younger generation of officers that does not remember or like Camp David is going to have different views than the Sisi generation.
I hope you’re right man.. I’ve lived with those for so long that I’ve lost hope in them..
Did you forget about this? This was 7 years ago.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/03/world/middleeast/israel-airstrikes-sinai-egypt.html
The younger generation will look at pictures of Gaza and not want this to happen to Cairo. Oh and the younger generation hates the Muslim Brotherhood too. Jordan just banned it.
Most Israeli opinion polls consistently show that the majority of Israelis believe that Netanyahu is prolonging the war for purely domestic political reasons. Once the war is over then his coalition will fracture and he will have to face a full trial (with no delays like what is happening currently) on corruption charges.
That being said, while I agree with you that it is a 2bn vs 7 million sectarian fight between Jews and Muslims, the core difference between this and other “colonial” conflicts is (1) Israeli Jews have a strong attachment to the land that predates the Islamic conquest, (2) the vast majority have nowhere else to go so will stay and fight, and (3) there is no alternative reality where Muslims accept the Jews as equals which leads the Israelis to view this through the lens of a permanent war: October 7th is the inevitable outcome if the Israeli State is incapable of defending her own people.
Netanyahu will go down as one of the most destructive individuals in Jewish history and one of the most despised leaders in the early 21st century. I can easily foresee in 10 years a significant reduction in military aid to Israel from the U.S.. However, the Jews are not Afrikaners, they are not pied noirs, and this very paranoia is why they will be more persistent than even you could predict.
I agree they will not be going anywhere for the reasons you identified which is why this conflict is and will be much worse than any of the other anticolonial wars. Maybe some dual citizens will leave if things get too difficult but a core of at least a few million will stay no matter what. I didn’t get too deep into the scenarios but use of nuclear weapons by Israel and October 7 x 1000 strike me as foreseeable outcomes in the long-term. Regarding Netanyahu he is a very polarizing figure but it would be overstatement to say he doesn’t have a strong and significant base that still supports him. He’s a charismatic Great Man of History ultimately and he has had a profound impact on the course of this conflict and beyond.
I am a Zionist so you need to take my opinion with a grain of salt, but for the "Zionist entity" to be destroyed it needs the Arab and Muslim world to do something totally paradoxical: accept Israel as a Jewish state, open up trade and security relations with them, and foster some form of visa-free travel including allowing foreign Muslims to go to Al-Aqsa etc.
Israel's very raison d'etre is the protection of the Jewish people. Protection from what, exactly? The threat of extermination. So take that away by fostering and institutionalising interaction between Israeli Jews and non-Palestinian Arab Muslims. It will take decades to work it's way through both Palestinian Muslim and Israeli Jewish societies, but what Israeli Jews really want is acceptance by their Muslim neighbours.
I give the above 0% chance of happening. This is a sectarian fight and has been that way for decades.
No need to take with grain of salt I appreciate hearing perspective of Israelis and Zionists. I've always shared the view that its easier to integrate economically and normalize political ties as a means of ameliorating political conflicts. Due to decisions made on both sides at this point, this option gradually ceased to be realistic as a means of ending this particular war. I wouldn't say its totally impossible but its very much at the brink now given how the current situation ends (if it ends). The irony is that the Arab League is now more in favor of a pragmatic outcome and has been for a few decades now while the Israeli government takes the more maximalist and messianic perspective and rejects a 1967-ish settlement with the Palestinians and regional integration except on terms of submission. If they do liquidate Gaza (seems likely at this point) there are just no diplomatic off-ramps left and we have to resign ourselves to the unhappy conclusion that is something like the Ninth Crusade that will take up generations of violent and non-violent struggle.
You talk about the 2 billion Muslims and yet many countries are lining up to join the Abraham Accords, and the Muslim world is secularizing and going through a demographic transition.
Israel's fertility rate remains high while the Palestinians' fertility rate consistently drops. If there was a one-state solution *right now*, then Jews would already be the majority. UNRWA is facing massive funding cuts because of 10/7 and Israel banned them from operating. Lebanon and Syria are talking about normalizing with Israel.
I think you are just way off on this one. I really do think that the Saudis and Emiratis are making the right bet here.
You have to either be a shill or an inbecile to frame this being about religion and not about occupied vs occupier. Most opinion polls shows majority Israeli support for the genocide in Gaza, and that speaks volumes
And a majority of Palestinians polled supported Hamas’s October 7 attacks where Hamas even murdered Muslims saying that they “worked for the Jews”. (https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/poll-shows-palestinians-back-oct-7-attack-israel-support-hamas-rises-2023-12-14/).
If this is not a sectarian war then Jews in Israel or around the world would not be attacked, global Muslim sentiment would not be universally outraged, but pretending this is “occupied” vs “occupier” is just an attempt to twist the conflict into something that is not a full and accurate representation of reality.
I like the link to Chinese arms mentioned in the previous article. However, I am not sure I agree with some of the introductory statements. In particular « none of [Israel’s neighbours] are able to intervene… even if they oppose it ». Given Egypt and Jordan’s explicit involvement in helping Israel, it seems hard to conclude they are reluctantly standing out. Even Turkey I think you mentioned in a previous article has only issued pithy statements to date and is more interested in their own long term power gain. If we are returning to power politics from the liberal order it seems unlikely that the long term power play of Turkey is Palestinian liberation rather than their own advancement.
Your analysis of the big picture (regression to the mean) seems spot on but I fail to see how Israel's short-term decisions in Gaza make much difference. If you had asked me about the Muslim world's relationship to Israel on Oct 6, 2023, I would have said that (i) most Muslims are strongly opposed to Israel's existence, as are many Muslim governments but (ii) a few Muslim countries, driven by their elites, have decided it's better to accept Israel's existence and make peace. If you asked me the same question today, my answer would largely be the same. The only difference being that Saudi Arabia joining the 'peace with Israel' club is much less likely or immediate today (which of course was one of Hamas' motives for the launching the attack.
So essentially after 2 years of war we have a major slowdown in reproachment between the Saudis and Israel, no backtracking by countries that signed the Camp David or Abraham Accords, and continued hostility from the Arab Street. Which is not a great situation for Israel, but also not one that's likely to be modified in less than generations no matter what Israel does.
This is good analysis but I actually disagree in the sense that there is a substrata of military officers, bureaucrats, intelligence people etc of the younger generation who are now very radicalized about this subject and think Camp David was a mistake, there are no good Israelis etc. This is a critical layer of people in any society and arguably more important than the masses who can be swayed one way or another with enough effort.
One can finally hope for an end to the conflict, or it may last another 700 years instead of 70. If the only thing left are high lander rules, and there can only be one, than that's the only option remaining. If this article is right and the Islamic world, will re-arm and modernize, then this Israel's window to do it, and simply announce the size of their nuclear stockpile after the job is done.
For Gen Alpha (or whatever we are supposed to call people born around the turn of the century) the Gaza genocide is a formative political experience. Moreover, it is linked to a cause (Palestine) that has been an open wound for at least three earlier generations of people who identify as Arabs or Muslims.
By the way, I like this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wznD7uCEcLk
You should talk to Yair Rosenberg again. A podcast or something would be nice, or some written exchange like point and counterpoint. The Abrahamic Alliance against the Iranian regime is a great idea, and I saw your piece on how the Iranian regime is ideologically anti-American and you can't have Trump towers in Tehran. I'm open to the Palestinian state *in principle* but you have to make sure it doesn't become a Hamas state and I'm a bit skeptical of that.
Your friendship with Yair Rosenberg is great and inspiring, and among the critics of Israel you are one of the most intellectually honest there is. It also helps that you are not against the existence of Israel, which is good.
The anti-Israel crowd has bet a lot on the genocide accusation, but I think the legal case is quite weak. I think when the ruling comes down it's going to be good for Israel. Falsely accusing a county full of Jews of genocide is really not a good look, for obvious historical reasons. Anti-Israel sentiment in the US seems as bad as it's ever going to get. I don't know if people will think about this war much in 20 years. People nowadays barely remember 9/11. Americans who are 10 years old now won't remember it, but they might remember the false accusation of genocide. They will see the Abraham Accords though.
https://manifold.markets/Shump/will-the-icj-determine-that-israel
I expect the Saudis to join the Abraham Accords, and Palestinian fertility to crash down so the demographics will become more favorable to Israel. Already it's falling very quickly. A modernized Islamic world means a less nationalistic and religious one and one with falling fertility rates. If Muslim countries do look more like Turkey, I expect more accommodating sentiments towards Israel. What you actually see in places like Tunisia is secularism and low TFRs without getting rich, so the cultural environment of Turkey but without the economic strength of Turkey. Seems like they will become less threatening to Israel if anything.
Palestinian TFR will fall below replacement while Israeli TFR will remain high. And falling TFRs in other Arab states means that these states will start wanting to accepting Palestinian migrants to support their aging populations.
Due to the transition away from oil, the Saudis and Emiratis will be more reliant on tech and AI, which is a big part of the Abraham Accords. Qatar will not have a good time as everyone switches to solar. They are big funders of Islamists.
I don't see the conflict as becoming more sectarian and anti-Muslim at all. There are Muslim Bedouin IDF soldiers killed in the war, and the Saudis want to join the Abraham Accords. There is even talk of Syria joining.
I also think that Israel is going to become more and more self-sufficient in arms and rely less on the United States. I also see the Israeli tech sector continuing to grow as it has been in the past. Even amid the war, there is a lot of investment in tech. Israel will become a big player in AI and so on.
We should revisit this post in 10 years.
Why are you advocating for the re-creation of an open air prison? Arab states and militant Islamists have wanted to eradicate Israel since its creation. Maybe a more prosperous Middle East will mean fewer countries interested in being hotbeds of terrorism and fewer individuals interested in throwing their lives away. Regardless, a separate Palestinian state, such as Gaza, will clearly just continue to be used to foment suffering of its population and used as a pretext for continued violence.
The key question remains however as to how deep-rooted the anti-Islam feelings there are in the former colonial powers such as France and Britain? Might these forces see a bulwark, albeit a very misguided and out of control, Israel as a strategic necessity in a world where Cold War fears of Soviet advance from the Middle East have been rekindled by Putin? I can accept the scale comparisons between Muslim countries and Israel but since the 1967 war there has been no sign of a unified or Pan Arab sentiment.
Most of the Muslim states in the Gulf are also Western clients though and don't seem to care too much about the Palestinian cause, only self-interest. Egypt is the second biggest recipient of US military aid after Israel, and even China is still benefitting from the US global system. Your thesis about the balance of power swinging away from Israel relies on the US collapsing to the extent that the entire Western neocolonial system begins to unfold and the US withdraws from or faces diminished influence in the middle-east, or can no longer afford the financial burden of arming Israel, precipitating the point at which Israel switches from being America's most important strategic asset to being little more than a liability. But this is still decades away, so I feel like your thesis is taking a longer term vision 30-50 years from now or even further. The change in global opinion will hopefully come well before that, without the need to wait decades for a global power shift of that magnitude. In the case of Apartheid South Africa it took 20 years after the UN convention on apartheid for America's allies in Western Europe to finally change their stance thus compelling a change of policy from Washington regarding its support for Apartheid South Africa. This may yet happen with Israel, but the US will only be compelled to temper its support for Israel if all its allies desert it and the US finds itself completely isolated on the issue of Palestine. Significant public movements within Western Europe will have to take responsibility for pressuring their respective governments to turn their backs on US-Israeli policy. But beyond that I don't know what they longterm forecast is.
To be clear I do see this forecast as being a generational one that would come to pass in the lifetime of people who are kids today not a short-medium term outcome. That said history does move on fast forward these days due to technology so you never know.
"Now" it's genocide? So you've been lying for the past 18 months?
So why no Arab or any other countries just bomb israel out of its existence? why are we all watching the destruction of a proud brave courageous nation?
Well they've something called nuclear weapons
I know that but they can be bombed before they realize it. a surprise attack.